Wakehurst Parkway Sydney: Australia’s most haunted road

A busy road north of Sydney is not the type of place you would usually associate with the supernatural, but the Wakehurst Parkway has for years been linked with reported sightings of a mysterious female figure, with claims the apparition has even appeared in the back seat of people’s cars before disappearing.

The ghost, known as ‘Kelly’, has reputedly terrified motorists over the past five decades. Rumours that circulated among locals on Sydney's northern beaches had suggested it might be linked to a woman killed in a car accident. But now a new theory has emerged from accounts gathered.

Those who have claimed to have seen ‘Kelly’ say she appears on or beside the 16km long road late at night and then disappears when motorists swerve to avoid her or look back to check… only to see nothing.

(Nine)The Wakehurst Parkway is a major route on Sydney's northern beaches, which drivers have reported is haunted. (Nine)

“She’s been described as looking like a nun, or somebody wearing a wedding dress,” filmmaker Bianca Biasi told nine.com.au.

Biasi, 39, has become an expert on the area’s ghostly going’s on. Not only did she grow up on the Northern Beaches, she’s interviewed around 100 people who claim to have seen ‘Kelly’.

Biasi now believes she is close to revealing the secret of the so-called ghostly presence - with the help of another haunted spot nearby – Manly’s Quarantine station.

The Quarantine Station, now home to a hotel, was where shop passengers were taken on arrival in Sydney. (NSW State Library)

The Quarantine Station is where thousands of travellers arriving in Sydney by ship were sent between the 1830s and 1984 to prevent them spreading disease. Many died in the site’s hospital.

Related Articles

“What we’ve actually realised is, because we do a lot of work at the Quarantine Station, I actually saw a photo recently of what the nurses used to wear there. The old nurses uniform - it was identical (to descriptions),” she said.

“It’s not actually a nun or a wedding dress - this is a nurse’s outfit. It could be that she lived locally, and worked at the Quarantine Station. There’s definitely a link.”

MYSTERY WOMAN

Could nurses at the Quarantine Station have a link with the Wakehurst Parkway ghost? (Quarantine Station)

Biasi is now trawling through old records to attempt to find somebody with that name who might have a gruesome link to the Parkway.

As part of her research, she has also waded through interviews from people who claims to have seen Kelly - including drivers not local to the area.

“We had one girl who gave me shivers,” she said.

“Her and her mum were driving down the Wakehurst Parkway. It was late night and they saw something in the middle of the road.

Kelly, played by an actress in one of Bianca Biasi and Grant Osborn's projects, Journeys into the Unknown. (Bianca Biasi)

“Her mother swerved, and then once they got closer to it she said at first it looked like a bright light. Her mother swerved and went up into the side of the road. When she swerved she described it was as she went through her.”

Biasi said the girl told her when she and her mother looked back the bright light was gone.

“She described the ghost and said it was almost like her feet weren’t even touching the ground,” Biasi said.

“It’s an eerie place.”

STENCH OF BLOOD

Filmmaker Bianca Biasi has interviewed around 100 people who claim to have see "kelly' or had a mysterious experience on the Wakehurst parkway. (Bianca Biasi)

Biasi, who has worked with film maker Grant Osborn, on TV pilot Journey's into the Unknown as well as upcoming film 11 and doco Haunted Shores, all of which feature the road, said she has experienced strange goings on in the area too.

While filming, a mysterious light appeared behind an actress who was dressed up as “Kelly”. The crew have been unable to figure out where the light source was coming from.

At the same time, the actress went white and described her blood rushing to her feet.

Meanwhile, at Deep Creek - an isolated area of bushland along the road - two actors were physically sick while others described smelling blood.

The Quarantine Station is where thousands of travellers arriving in Sydney by ship were sent between the 1830s and 1984 to prevent them spreading disease. Many died in the site’s hospital. (AAP)

UNWELCOME PASSENGERS

Trawl online and claims of sightings on the Parkway are not had to find.

Sydney-based Burmese cab driver Hla Oo also shared a chilling account of an experience he had back in 2010 when he claimed he saw a grey silhouette of thin young woman sitting on the rear seat of his car.

“She was in a kind of white gown and head-dress like a Christian nun. I couldn’t really see her face clearly, just the shape of her face and her deep green eyes, yes the sad green eyes, but she was definitely real and sitting there and staring back at me at that precise moment. I slammed the brake hard,” he wrote in a blog post.

He claimed on a separate night, he picked up a female passenger he had driven before who asked to be taken to the same sport where the apparition appeared.

Deep Creek, which is along the Wakehurst Parkway is one of the allegedly haunted spots. (Supplied)

Hla later discovered the female passenger had died a few weeks earlier.

Other drivers have described picking up a blood-covered girl on the Parkway and taking her to hospital only for her to suddenly disappear.

Some have recounted car electricals such as windscreen wipers going haywire along the route, or simply feeling like they’d driven into an eerie ‘twilight zone’.

One man even reported hearing a girl scream “Help me! Help me” from the bushes when he stopped on the road, which was built in 1939.

SCEPTICAL BELIEVERS

However, Todd Fox from Greater Sydney Paranormal Investigations said he’s yet to gather any real evidence of apparitions on the road.

The Wakehurst parkway is a 16km route north of Sydney- and home to a ghost called Kelly. (NSW State Library)

However, he does believe there is something eerie about the stretch.

“It’s got a feel about the whole place,” Mr Fox told nine.com.au.

“The amount of people that see it and don’t really want to talk about it for fear of ridicule - even the most sceptical of sceptics.

The Wakehurst Parkway was completed in 1939 on Sydney's northern beaches, and is reported to be haunted. (NSW State Library)

HAUNTED ROADS AROUND THE WORLD

Victoria Pass, NSW

The ‘woman in black’ is said to cling to the back of vehicles on this Blue Mountains part of The Great Western Highway.

She’s said to be the child bride Caroline Collits who was murdered there in 1842 by her ex-husband.

The Wakehurst Parkway, on Sydney’s northern beaches, is notorious for sightings of a female ghost, with claims the apparition has appeared in the back seat of people’s cars before disappearing. (Supplied)

The Bloody Mile, NSW

This stretch of road in Shellharbour between the Princes Highway and the railway line is the site of more than a dozen murders. Victims are said to walk up and down the route, moaning.

Boy Scout Lane, Wisonsin, US

According to local legend, a group of scouts went camping in this isolated spot in the 1950s. They are believed to have been killed by their scout master or simply disappeared in the night.

Those brave enough to venture close to the spot claim to have heard the voices of children whispering, or seen lights resembling lanterns swinging through the trees.

A696, Northumberland, UK

A pair of radio DJs claimed to have picked up a man wearing an RAF uniform on the isolated stretch late one night in 2015. They say he had his arm out, but they couldn’t stop in time, and so turned back to see if he needed help.

When they got back to the location, he had disappeared. The area was the exact spot where an RAF jet crashed in WW2.

A75, Dumfriesshire, Scotland

This stretch is dubbed the most haunted road in Scotland, for strange creatures ghostly apparitions, said to include a giant cat, a chicken and even a furniture van which appear, before suddenly vanishing.